Details

Title

The Plays of J.M. Barrie: The Admirable Crichton

Subtitle

A Comedy

Author

Barrie, J.M.

Place of Publication

London

Publisher

Hodder and Stoughton

Date of Publication

1928 Show more1928-01-01T00:00:00.000Z
1928-01-01T00:00:00.000Z Show less

Collection

Scans provided by and used with permission of Archival & Special Collections, University of Guelph Library. From the L.M. Montgomery Collection.

Note

Montgomery loved the novels of J.M. Barrie. Before her 1911 honeymoon she wrote to George MacMillan that she hoped to see all the “scenes of Barrie’s novels” on her trip (see My Dear Mr. M, eds. Epperly and Bolger, p. 58). She did get to see his Kirriemuir, the “Thrums” referred to in the title of one of his books. Later in his career, however, Barrie turned to writing more plays than fiction, and Montgomery was rather disappointed. In 1937, Montgomery told her other correspondent, Ephraim Weber that Barrie “was one of the world’s idols in my girlhood when ‘The Little Minister’ and ‘Sentimental Tommy’ took the planet by storm. … It was a tragedy to me when Barrie gave up writing novels and took to writing plays – because in those days I could neither see nor read the plays. Of late years I have read several and enjoyed them – especially ‘The Admirable Crichton’ and ‘Mary Rose’” (see “After Green Gables,” eds. Tiessen and Tiessen, p. 233-34). Her letter to Weber goes on to recount the details of the latter play and a long description of her reaction to it. She ends the letter by noting that “There will not be another Barrie.” Interestingly, while Montgomery spent so much more time discussing “Mary Rose,” the “Admirable Crichton” has had the staying power. The comic play has been adapted numerous times for stage and screen, most notably in a 1957 movie starring Kenneth More. The play tells the story of a wealthy British family stranded on a deserted island. As the boundaries of their upstairs/downstairs class system crumble under the circumstances, it is their butler Crichton who rises to the occasion and whose choices reveal some of the weaknesses of those class distinctions. Note, too, that in Montgomery’s copy here, she has pasted in a clipping of the Dorothy Parker poem “Second Love.” Why Montgomery added this clipping in this book is not clear.

Genre

drama